I am a Senior Political Contributor at Forbes and the official 'token lefty,' as the title of the page suggests. However, writing from the 'left of center' should not be confused with writing for the left as I often annoy progressives just as much as I upset conservative thinkers. In addition to the pages of Forbes.com, you can find me every Saturday morning on your TV arguing with my more conservative colleagues on "Forbes on Fox" on the Fox News Network and at various other times during the week serving as a liberal talking head on other Fox News and Fox Business Network shows. I also serve as a Democratic strategist with Mercury Public Affairs.

Edward Snowden Blows It

While it was inevitable that there would be those who support and those who condemn the initial disclosures of Edward Snowden—the 29 year-old former NSA contractor who disclosed the agency’s telephone and electronic communications surveillance programs—the tide of public opinion may be rapidly turning against Snowden…and with very good reason.

Spilling the beans to his fellow Americans over the depth of surveillance being carried out by the National Security Agency within the borders of the United States is one thing—disclosing the nation’s covert activities involving spying on other nations is something else entirely.

Last week, Snowden turned over documents to the South China Morning Post revealing that the United States has been hacking into Chinese computers—a revelation that came at a particularly embarrassing moment for the U.S. President who was busy castigating his Chinese counterpart for China’s constant intrusions into our own computer banks for various purposes, including the theft of American intellectual property. If that wasn’t enough, the Guardian newspaper followed up with a report provided by Snowden revealing that the Americans and British spied on various delegates attending the G20 conference in 2009, choosing to disclose this bit of information right before the start of this year’s G8 conference held in the U.K.

Anyone think much got accomplished at the G8 after that little gem was brought into the light?

Even more disturbing is what appears to have motivated Snowden to expand his leaking beyond the borders of the United States and into the world of foreign espionage.

Despite making a pretty good living for quite a few years through his employment as a small cog in the gears of government surveillance activities, Snowden declared, during a live chat with the Guardian on Monday, that he believes that “all spying is wrong. all spying is wrong (SEE UPDATE AT END OF ARTICLE).” And because it is Snowden’s personal judgment that all spying is wrong, he also believes it appropriate that he reveal our covert activities to affected foreign governments without a shed of concern for what the rest of his fellow Americans might think about this.

I don’t recall there being an election where I voted to assign my proxy to Edward Snowden so that this 29 year-old guy—who I never heard of before two weeks ago—could determine, on my behalf, what this country should or should not be doing when it comes to its covert, overseas spying program.

So, how is it that Mr. Snowden has decided that it is appropriate to appoint himself the arbiter of judgment and morality when it comes to such issues? How is it that Snowden has determined that he is providing me with some patriotic service when I neither asked him to do so nor agree that disclosing information on foreign spying is, in any way, a service to his nation or to me personally?

With his decision to move beyond informing his countrymen of surveillance activities that allow the government to track our telephone calls and emails, Edward Snowden not only crossed a major line but gave us all reason to feel considerable concern about his motives and purposes.

In discussing the rationale for his disclosures on foreign spying, Snowden said:

“When NSA makes a technical mistake during an exploitation operation, critical systems crash. Congress hasn’t declared war on the countries — the majority of them are our allies — but without asking for public permission, NSA is running network operations against them that affect millions of innocent people. And for what? So we can have secret access to a computer in a country we’re not even fighting? So we can potentially reveal a potential terrorist with the potential to kill fewer Americans than our own Police? No, the public needs to know the kinds of things a government does in its name, or the ‘consent of the governed’ is meaningless.”

There appears to be no shortage of logic fails in Snowden’s remarks.

If the public knows the details of what our government is doing when it comes to spying on foreign governments—as Snowden suggests is necessary—then it wouldn’t be covert spying activity, now would it? Spying is not particularly effective when everyone knows the target and nature of such a program.

And while Ed Snowden may have decided that all spying is wrong, I strongly suspect that the overwhelming majority of Americans would very much disagree with his assessment and might appreciate his not complicating our lives in furtherance of his own self-aggrandizement and the soothing of whatever crisis of conscience he may be experiencing.

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rather naive of you Rick, since you may care what the president and congress “alleged” opinions are / were since you obviously voted for them, however, Rick, you really didn’t know what they were actually up to until Snowden blew the whistle and gave you / us clarification. So now you know, Rick, they are breaking our laws and the laws of many sovereign countries. Now that you know they are breaking our laws and the laws of other countries, Rick, shouldn’t you focus on what they think/do now? Always going after the messenger – our government is cheating us and the world in many ways. So many of our agencies waste our tax dollars openly and arrogantly defy the moral and ethics of this great country.

nice speech but completely misses the point of the article. It is always more useful to actually comment on the article rather than provide yet another rant about wasting tax dollars, etc., etc.,etc. Are you saying that we should not have a covert spy operation overseas? And how do you imagine that we have such an effort if everything about such a program is disclosed to everyone. You also don’t seem to grasp that just because you may not like a current president, we do have a system of government that is a Republic. If you don’t like who we’ve got making these decisions, vote for someone else. If you lose, suck it up like a true American and wait for the next election. Now, care to tell us what laws the US broke here, particularly as they pertain to sovereign nations or do you just make this stuff up as you go? And while you are at it, while I’m no fan of the domestic surveillance, what laws were broken in that circumstance? Try reading the Patriot Act- a law i don’t much care for but I’ll bet you were all for it.

You are representing yourself as a terrible journalist. “I’ll bet you were all for it” – What, exactly, in Jim’s statement identifies that he was or is for the Patriot Act?

“If you don’t like who we’ve got making these decisions, vote for someone else” – Right, because special interests don’t own both the Republicans and the Democrats. Asinine comment.

“The Trilateral Commission is intended to be the vehicle for multinational consolidation of the commercial and banking interests by seizing control of the political government of the United States.” – Senator Barry Goldwater “With no Apologies”

again Rick – our points seem to be passing each other in the night – my point is clearly that you assume or don’t care to know too much of what our government is doing and whether it is “policy” based or based upon our laws/international laws …your point seems clear enough and that is why I say you are extremely naive and your trust misguided or you are intentionally misleading others in efforts to minimize what is happening – Snowden is a hero – you are not. Snowden informs us of what is happening even to the extent of our government is breaking international law with programs mentioned – you see it as spy vs spy – I see it as dis-regarding our Constitution and Our Laws, as well as other sovereign Nations’ Laws – so that is the point and your point is vote them out of office ? So others can lie to us and do the same thing or what ? you offer no solution only criticize a Whistle Blower for informing the unknowing but trusting American People – Snowden did not ” Blow it ” – then you must also disagree with Daniel Ellsberg as calling Snowden the most significant Whistle Blower in American History – correct ? Further you seem to imply that this Democracy is kind of a pain in the ass just slowing our Trusted Politicians down too much – in case you continue to miss the big picture – Snowden is a hero — we do want to know what the potus and other corrupted politicians are doing since we did vote for them, albeit in error , truth or otherwise and We do Not Agree to suspend our Constitutional Rights for their “ secret purposes and agendas” for any reason. We are a Country of Laws and live in a World of Laws we must respect as a Nation. They have broken them on our behalf and I didn’t vote for that.

I thought his comment was on target (to begin with anyway). You say that we all should decide on this policy by voting for the appropriate person. But how are we supposed to do that if there is not an open debate on the policy in the first place? If Snowden doesn’t leak these programs, are either of the next presidential candidates (or any congressional candidates) going to come out for or against them? Of course not, because they are secret programs and nobody knows about them!

I completely take your point regarding Snowden’s disclosure of the domestic situation. If it wasn’t clear in the article, I not only don’t have a big problem with that, I’m somewhat supportive of what he did. My issue is with his disclosures regarding American spying activity overseas. I don’t really want Mr. Snowden deciding what should be told to the Chinese about our hacking program into their computers. I have no reason to have any faith in his judgment in deciding to do such a thing. That was my point.

Well, thanks for your dramatic statement of the obvious by pointing out that i am no hero. Truer words were never spoken. As for my knowing what my government is doing when it comes to spying activities involving foreign governments, you are absolutely correct- I do not think I should know about it. If I did, it wouldn’t exactly be covert now would it? I don’t have a problem with what Snowden disclosed involving the programs here in America involving collecting data on American citizens. however, you should be aware that he was not a ‘whisteblower’ as the programs are legal. If you dislike the programs (and I certainly have some problems with them) you can thank those who voted for the Patriot Act which made these activities legal. However, my beef is with his turning over classified data to foreign entities. that is not my idea of a hero. Sorry.

jim-not to worry…Ungar is so full of himself, (and something else), that reading his “contributions” to Forbes, I have found, is an exercise in futility. This is the way of the far left…everything is really political, and the ends justify the means. Want a good take on his ideology?

Rick will never apologize that he was wrong about those pesky ‘death panels’, nor will he ever admit that eugenics was a Progressive Idea that was trumpeted by the likes of Progressives, Margaret Sanger, George Bernard Shaw and economist Keynes. Nope…don’t expect Ungar to ever defend THOSE Progressives…he has his hands full with those present day sock puppets.

Jim, it is you who is being naive. Do you really think the majority of politicians–of all people–hold good conscience? You think they mean well? You trust their words? Their on-camera actions and behavior? Do you really think they have your best interest at heart? SACRIFICE is the ultimate test to know how someone feels about you. Most of these men have never or will ever sacrifice anything for you. A position in an office where you receive a lifetime pension after FIVE YEARS of service–where a soldier must give 20 YEARS of his/her life in order to get the same–is hardly a sacrifice. Most politicians are men/women after power, influence, control–not the whole-hearted consensus of the public, whom they will never sit and have coffee with.

What does a vote mean anyway? Real power is NOT voted in–never has been–since the dawn of time. Leadership ALWAYS makes it way through to the top as it has always done. Though I know you were taught different growing up in this country. Though we live in modern times, the only thing that has changed and evolved is our technology. The hearts of men are still the same as they have always been for centuries.

Our constitution, our laws, our freedoms seem to change as we go along–to fit the interests of the powers that be. Unless the American people take a stand against that power, this is the path we travel on.

And BTW, Snowden is no hero. He, like most of us, remain uninformed. He has only a partial picture of what is happening, what has happened, and what is going to happen in regards to spying–what a fool. An NSA contractor will never be “all-in”. His reports changes nothing for our populous. Besides, who is he or we to say that spying is not right? Too often, we do not look past our sentiments on subjects and see that there is a greater purpose to why certain things are being done.

Even I can see that the American (and by extension, Canadian) governments are hardly a proper democracy/republic. You vote for either moron A or moron B and you pick the one who’s policies will only mostly destroy the country instead of entirely destroy it. There is no “if you want to make change, vote for it” because every candidate is worse than the next.

In this instance it was good of him to show everyone just how badly Obama has been breaking all of his election promises since the start, I thought he’d be an incredible President and make America a better more respectable place, but he hasn’t changed almost anything and has expanded the spying program he said he was going to get rid of. I think those kind of things should be called out, especially if they’re now being used to spy on other countries after Obama said he would be getting rid of the program.

As someone saying you’re on the left, I’m surprised you don’t see how there is no left party. There are super-conservatives, kind of conservatives, and then some almost in the middle conservatives. I haven’t seen a true liberal in office for a long time.

Funny. Your comment stands as proof that we are a democracy-republic! That’s how we get ‘morons’ as candidates. You just don’t quite understand what a democracy is -you know, the part where you have to get off your butt to insure more qualified candidates if you don’t like the ones you are getting. Writing comments on blogs will not produce a better result- working for better candidates who represent your point of view will. By the way, Obama never said he would (a) get rid of the NSA programs either foreign or domestic. Show us where he said such a thing. He did say that he wanted better oversight of the domestic program. You can decide if that has happened or not. As for true liberals in office, if you mean all of government, then you just are not paying attention.

You don’t have a democracy, and you can’t have a democracy when the means of production have been concentrated into such a tiny, toxic portion of the population. I can’t believe the hypocrisy of telling Americans they should suck it up and wait four more years to vote… or that somehow if they just have to get off their butts to insure more qualified candidates. Your presidential choices are selected for you by Chase Manhattan Bank. To pretend otherwise makes you look like a fool.

Well said. I “startpaged” Snowden on recent news and found the title ‘Snowden Blows it’. It caught me alright and an article that leaves me with only regretting what I just read. I just wasted my time on a huge assumption and more speculation than anything.

I typically don’t read mainstream news, because you’re in the business of propaganda and ‘manufacturing consent’ but I couldn’t help fall on this ridiculous article – which, not surprisingly, justifies my boycott.

I’m interested to hear how you justify the NSA’s actions given that your country was founded on principles that oppose the majority of laws that have been passed of late. The Republic was made great by your constitution. However the NSA, along with Obama, Bush and the rest of your tyrannical leaders have ruined the very foundation of democracy by desecrating the Bill of Rights and the Constitution.

The Fourth Amendment “guards against unreasonable searches and seizures, along with requiring any warrant to be judicially sanctioned and supported by probable cause”. When innocent individuals are being wiretapped incessantly and without cause, that is both illegal and immoral. I’m interested how you justify this. Are we now guilty until proven innocent?

My question to you is this – What is the payoff for Ed Snowden? He has reiterated this in his many interviews. His likely fate is death, or imprisonment for treason. If he was a true egomaniac or self-aggrandizing as you put it – would he not be obsessed with power and money? Would he not instead go with the metaphorical flow and either keep earning his six figure salary, or sell state secrets to foreign powers?

Regarding this quote – “I don’t recall there being an election where I voted to assign my proxy to Edward Snowden so that this 29 year-old guy—who I never heard of before two weeks ago—could determine, on my behalf, what this country should or should not be doing when it comes to its covert, overseas spying program.” – Have you watched his 10 minute video? Judging from this statement, it is clear that you haven’t. He states that it is not up to the NSA to decide what is ethical but instead “the public needs to decide whether these programs and policies are right or wrong.” Clearly you have drawn a line in the sand, but it isn’t your individual decision to make.

Ed Snowden is no traitor. He is a hero and a true patriot. Rick Ungar, on the other hand, is anti-American, and is leaving a legacy of justified surveillance, hypocrisy and subjugation of the people. Congratulations. You’ve achieved so much.

thanks for your comment. I would like to reply and expand on the subject of tyrannical leaders in the USA. Tyranny is a form or authoritarian or totalitarian dictator leadership.

I studied ‘leadership methodologies’ for years (Ph.D. level). No, I am not going to write a dissertation here.

Just want to mention, that we need to consider the crisis management factor. The more volatile the economy, the more pressing a crisis may be. Any given level of urgency in a crisis requires the right combination of leadership styles / methodologies to manage the crisis.

A simple example: Your toddler son breaks loose on the sidewalk right on a busy road (lots of dangerous traffic – could kill him). He runs towards the edge of the sidewalk, you know, bus, taxi, construction, all of the above… very dangerous. You fear that your son gets insured. So what leadership style do you apply? A democratic based one, because you want to contemplate with your son if he had chosen a good strategy? Or a more dictator-alike style?

Of course we are not toddlers. And the big brother is not seeing us as such. But ‘they’ don’t trust us. They don’t want a revolt, they don’t want a Greek repeat, especially with 350 million some weapons in the civilians’ hands… along that line.

The big brother needs to find ‘legal’ ways to suppress us. Or they are going to have a total gov collapse, overrun, even fearing for a coop.

The motive? It’s about the money, their cronies, and all of these people’s powers and control. That is exactly why all this BS and lying and spying is going on. …Besides, I believe 9/11 was fabricated by the same dictators, once again, it was about the money. Their money and their cronies’ money.

its always about the money. Forbes is brown-nosing it, trying to help skew propaganda opinions. Wow, ‘the opinion of the American people may have shifted’…. along that line. What a crock.

How I see it is that the big brother, Barry especially, is covering up (once again) lies with lies. We, and I can safely speak for others in my community, don’t trust the big brother any longer, or in other words, Forbes and other brown-nosing media entities.

You media folks have it coming. You only complain when you fear your big brother is starting to go against you.

Democracy? A democracy fails when the people don’t trust their government and the media any more. Call yourself lucky, Mr. Ungar, that people posting here in this comment section, and not in front of your door. That is democracy! Be grateful for civility.

In America, unfortunately, the Media wants to influence the people. And then we have all these one-sided bailouts. To one hand, the people are not supposed to hold up their hands for hand outs, but the Fed is buying toxic assets. The people are supposed to sacrifice liberty for security.

Of course lying is bad, and so is spying. The media is spying too. Of course spying should stop on a global basis. Will it stop? Not as long as there is greed and not as long as when it’s always about the money. Give up your money and riches first, and then we shall see.

Snowden, Manning, etc… heroes. In time the history books will reflect that.

It’s ironic Snowden first went to China to speak about the Government’s violation of rights. One theory is that he got paid. With so many conflicting opinions, is this guy really a traitor, hero or clown? http://theunisourcegroup.com/voices-in-the-dark

What if Snowden got paid? So what? Let him. Releasing info of the USA spying on other countries…? Snowden needed to demonstrate that his information is legitimate. It would be naive to think that we are the only country spying on other countries. Everybody spies on everyone else. I too spy on my competitors all the time. And if I could, I would do more than that to destroy my competition.

Forbes, and the rest of the mainstream brown-nosing media are all the same. It’s about the money. So what if Snowden got paid, or still gets paid? Forbes gets paid too. …. Get my point?

It’s funny how some folks and countries boast “how dare the USA spying on us”. How dare xyz got paid? So what? The point is that the government, Barry especially, lied about it. Well, that is what spying is all about.

If we want world-peace, we have got to stop it. But the US, or the war industry machine does not want to stop it’s revenue supply. So spying and lying has to continue, at any costs. Plus, the elite thinks we are over-populated anyway. The whole world is corrupted. We will not have peace until after World War III.

Snowden in my opinion, regardless of his motives, been paid or not, is still a hero. No money is worth to get killed for…

The writer’s need to mention “so that this 29 year-old guy” illustrates an older generations inability to grasp what Millennials accept as their right: to transparency. By casting his age as making him unreliable or impetuous is distracts from the debate of the issues at hand. Nice try.

Have the boundaries of American law expanded to accept unwarranted state surveillance of its citizenry as remedy to civil threats? Isn’t that the real question on everyone’s mind? And doesn’t it suddenly feel like a rewriting of history, like we lost the Revolutionary War? Discourse and thoughts about whether Snowden is a martyr or a traitor should not be conflated with the purity of his message. Nobody is calling him a liar anyway. Are we better off as a society when we allow government to demand from the private sector information gained from citizenry in the course of doing business? Who is the greater beneficiary, the powerless relinquishing privacy or the powerful accessing it? Snowden may be anti-American, pro-American or a believer in old-school utopianism, but his character is an isolated issue and using it to intentionally muddy the purity of the message is, in a sense, answering the above questions.

Yep. I wanted to see where these revelations that Snowden was “sharing” with the American people and the rest of the free, and not so free world were heading after your last article on the subject. This is a republic…and sometimes one that I do not think performs as intended. The domestic surveillance that Snowden is divulging seems to only confirm that the government is taking full advantage of the more intrusive data gathering abilities that congress has allowed. That does not make him a patriot or a whistleblower, it makes him an individual who has knowingly illegally distributed confidential material. Or in a more raw description…a criminal. Likewise for his releasing of international surveillance information. As I had said before, there is a part of me that appreciates that this guys actions might jolt some heretofore apathetic voters into becoming more aware but Snowden will nonetheless have to pay for his crimes.

The system of checks and balance is fundamental to democracy, however there is neither check nor balance if programs are run covertly. Democracy is predicated on trusting your citizens, just as it was argued that Snowden did not have the authority to leak these secrets because he was not an elected official, the American public also did not have a chance to decide in election whether they wanted to support these programs via their locally elected politicians.

What is wrong with transparency, do you think this program would have been any less effective if it were public, do you think spies or terrorists use gmail and facebook? The problem here is that under darkness, the program has strayed from monitoring foreigners to monitoring the AMERICAN PUBLIC, a significant breach of the U.S.Constitution with dangerous implications. From what I understand from Snowden’s interview, that it was this shift to collecting data on American citizens at this level that caused him to come out as a whistle blower.

Do you really understand the scope of this program? Since terrorism is now domestic, intelligence is needed domestically and ALL data is gathered and stored ad infintum, but NOT analyzed on an individual basis. However if an event happens like the Boston bombing, then the all the data on the individual culprits and EVERYONE who they had contact with will be drilled down and highly scrutinized to an individual level and physically monitored if necessary. This is GOOD if you are catching a bomber, but BAD if someone is abusing this power on fellow US citizens for political or some other self-serving purpose. I don’t know exactly what Snowden thinks, but the unfortunately reality is that we need this capability, but there should be a STRONG and OPEN system of checks and balances put in to ensure that the data is being used according to the constitution of the United States. Certainly, a civilian contractor should not have this kind of power in his hand, this program has obviously gotten sloppy and would have been right for abuse if someone like Snowden did not step up. That is the problem with this kind of program being kept secret, there is not enough eyes checking to see if everything is checked and balanced.

Let me be be perfectly frank, I do not trust this kind of power under any circumstance other than full transparency. I have seen fear-mongers in this nation convince the nation to start a preemptive war over bad intelligence, and I have seen abuses of all kind from elected officials, if you ask me this kind of leak from Snowden is the result of a democratic system self-checking.

The question is really not about Snowden as he points out himself, the question is what are we going to do as a people to change the system so that people who tell the truth are not branded traitors by people who support lies.

Do you not see the flaw in expecting transparency in covert spy programs aimed at foreign entities. If it is transparent it would hardly be covert. And if you are going to tell those from who you seek information that you are spying on them, what is the point? Thus, I can presume you object to all spying of foreign entities? Want to get rid of the CIA?

It is well know all countries will spy on each other and their own people for security reasons. The bigger question is how we the people have allowed the “governments” to take away our freedom and right to privacy.

Rick, If you are a true journalist, you would be doing in depth research and verification of real facts, not what others (editors) tell you what to say by “officials”.

Research the following topics then draw your own conclusions: 1. The United States is a federal corporation – 28 USC 3002 (15) 2. The Federal Reserve is not a government agency, it is a privately owned bank – 1913 Federal reserve Act 3. The members and purpose of the Tri-Lateral Commission 4. The members and purpose of the Council of Foreign Relations 5. The real history of the creation of the United States, and the declaration of Independence as written by the Free Masons. 6. Infiltration of the Illuminati into the Free Masons 7. Who owns and provides direction to the major news media. 8. The real purpose of the Patriot Act specifically sections 215, 206 and 6001. 9. The truth of the attacks of 9/11 10. What is your Strawman and how the banks are ripping you off. 11. Why the Internal Revenue Service is committing fraud by collecting tax from American Nationals not connected with a trade or business. 12. The synergy between the Vatican, Washington D.C. and The City of London AKA The Crown. 13. Why does the American dollar bill have the Egyptian pyramid and the all seeing eye of Ra? 14. We really do not elect the President, the Democratic and Republican parties do. Las Vegas slot machines have more regulation certification and verification than the voting machines.

There is so much more and the bottom line is

Ever wonder why foreigners call Americans Pigs?

Consider this analogy between a young man and a professor:

Do you know how to catch wild pigs?’ The professor thought it was a joke and asked for the punch line. The young man said this was no joke. ‘You catch wild pigs by finding a suitable place in the woods and putting corn on the ground. The pigs find it and begin to come every day to eat the free corn. When they are used to coming every day, you put a fence down one side of the place where they are used to coming. When they get used to the fence, they begin to eat the corn again and you put up another side of the fence. They get used to that and start to eat again. You continue until you have all four sides of the fence up with a gate in the last side. The pigs, which are used to the free corn, start to come through the gate to eat; you slam the gate on them and catch the whole herd. Suddenly the wild pigs have lost their freedom. They run around and around inside the fence, but they are caught. Soon they go back to eating the free corn. They are so used to it that they have forgotten how to forage in the woods for themselves, so they accept their captivity.

This is a fairly simple issue. A man stole classified information from the intelligence community. He then divulged that information to journalists.

You might be happy that the information he divulged is public (never mind that everyone already knew about what he divulged).

But it was treason what he did. You can call him a hero. You can praise him. Hold a parade in his honor. But it was, in fact a crime. And he should be held accountable for it lest others feel that they also should be able to get away with similar crimes.

What is the point of having an intelligence community or defense community with covert operations if their employees are going to decide to just talk about them to reporters.